#not be people. this is an acceptable thing to say to someone i consider a friend'.

[caelum-in-the-avatarverse]

Fandom can do a little gatekeeping. As a treat.

So I finally decided to archive-lock my fics on AO3 last night. I’ve been considering it since the AI scrape last year, but the tipping point was this whole lore.fm debacle, coupled with some thoughts I’ve been thinking regarding Fandom These Days in general and Fandom As A Community in particular. So I wanna explain why I waited so long, why I locked my stuff up now, and why I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m a-okay with making it harder for people to see my stories.

Lurkers really are great, tho

I’m a chronic lurker, and have been since I started hanging out on the internet as a teen in the 00s. These days it’s just cuz I don’t feel a need to socialize very often, but back then it was because I was shy and knew I was socially awkward. Even if I made an account, I’d spend months lurking on message boards or forums or Livejournals, watching other people interact and getting a feel for that particular community’s culture and etiquette before I finally started interacting myself. And y’know, that approach saved me a lot of embarrassment. Over the course of my lurking on any site, there was always some other person who’d clearly joined up five minutes after learning the place existed, barged in without a care for their behavior, and committed so many social faux pas that all the other users were immediately annoyed with them at best. I learned a lot observing those incidents. Lurk More is Rule 33 of the internet for very good reason.

Lurking isn’t bad or weird or creepy. It’s perfectly normal. I love lurking. It’s hard for me to not lurk - socializing takes a lot of energy out of me, even via text. (Heck it took 12 hours for me to write this post, I wish I was kidding--) Occasionally I’ll manage longer bouts of interaction - a few weeks posting here, almost a year chatting in a discord there - but I’m always gonna end up going radio silent for months at some point. I used to feel bad about it, but I’ve long since made peace with the fact that it’s just the way my brain works. I’m a chronic lurker, and in the long term nothing is going to change that.

The thing with being a chronic lurker is that you have to accept that you are not actually seen as part of the community you are lurking in. That’s not to say that lurkers are unimportant - lurkers actually are important, and they make up a large proportion of any online community - but it’s simple cause and effect. You may think of it as “your community”, but if you’ve never said a word, how is the community supposed to know you exist? If I lurked on someone’s LJ, and then that person suddenly friendslocked their blog, I knew that I had two choices: Either accept that I would never be able to read their posts again, or reach out to them and ask if I could be added to their friends list with the full understanding that I was a rando they might not decide to trust. I usually went with the first option, because my invisibility as a lurker was more important to me than talking to strangers on the internet.

Lurking is like sitting on a park bench, quietly people-watching and eavesdropping on the conversations other people are having around you. You’re in the park, but you’re not actively participating in anything happening there. You can see and hear things that you become very interested in! But if you don’t introduce yourself and become part of the conversation, you won’t be able to keep listening to it when those people walk away. When fandom migrated away from Livejournal, people moved to new platforms alongside their friends, but lurkers were often left behind. No one knew they existed, so they weren’t told where everyone else was going. To be seen as part of a fandom community, you need to submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known, etc. etc.

There’s nothing wrong with lurking. There can actually be benefits to lurking, both for the lurkers and the communities they lurk in. It’s just another way to be in a fandom. But if that is how you exist in fandom--and remember, I say this as someone who often does exist that way in fandom--you need to remember that you’re on the outside looking in, and the curtains can always close.

I’ve always been super sympathetic to lurkers, because I am one. I know there’s a lot of people like me who just don’t socialize often. I know there’s plenty of reasons why someone might not make an account on the internet - maybe they’re nervous, maybe they’re young and their parents don’t allow them to, maybe they’re in a bad situation where someone is monitoring their activity, maybe they can only access the internet from public computer terminals. Heck, I’ve never even logged into AO3 on my phone--if I’m away from my computer I just read what’s publicly available. 

I know I have people lurking on my fics. I know my fics probably mean a lot to someone I don’t even know exists. I know this because there are plenty of fics I love whose writers don’t know I exist.

I love my commenters personally; I love my lurkers as an abstract concept. I know they’re there and I wish them well, and if they ever de-lurk I love them all the more.

So up until last year I never considered archive-locking my fic, because I get it. The AI scraping was upsetting, but I still hesitated because I was thinking of lurkers and guests and remembering what it felt like to be 15 and wondering if it’d be worth letting a stranger on the internet know I existed and asking to be added to their friends list just so I could reread a funny post they made once.

But the internet has changed a lot since the 00s, and fandom has changed with it. I’ve read some things and been doing some thinking about fandom-as-community over the last few years, and reading through the lore.fm drama made me decide that it’s time for me to set some boundaries.

I still love my lurkers, and I feel bad about leaving any guest commenters behind, especially if they’re in a situation where they can’t make an account for some reason. But from here on out, even my lurkers are going to have to do the bare minimum to read my fics--make an AO3 account.

Should we gatekeep fandom?

I’ve seen a few people ask this question, usually rhetorically, sometimes as a joke, always with a bit of seriousness. And I think…yeah, maybe we should. Except wait, no, not like that--

A decade ago, when people talked about fandom gatekeeping and why it was bad to do, it intersected with a lot of other things, mainly feminism and classism. The prevalent image of fandom gatekeeping was, like, a man learning that a woman likes Star Wars and haughtily demanding, “Oh, yeah? Well if you’re REALLY a fan, name ten EU novels” to belittle and dismiss her, expecting that a “real fan” would have the money and time to be familiar with the EU, and ignoring the fact that male movie-only fans were still considered fans. The thing being gatekept was the very definition of “being a fan” and people’s right to describe themselves as one.

That’s not what I mean when I say maybe fandom should gatekeep more. Anyone can call themselves a fan if they like something, that’s fine. But when it comes to the ability to enjoy the fanworks produced by the fandom community…that might be something worth gatekeeping.

See, back in the 00s, it was perfectly common for people to just…not go on the internet. Surfing the web was a thing, but it was just, like, a fun pastime. Not everyone did it. It wasn’t until the rise of social media that going online became a thing everyone and their grandmother did every day. Back then, going on the internet was just…a hobby.

So one of the first gates online fandom ever had was the simple fact that the entire world wasn’t here yet.

The entire world is here now. That gate has been demolished.

And it’s a lot easier to find us now. Even scattered across platforms, fandom is so centralized these days. It isn’t a network of dedicated webshrines and forums that you can only find via webrings anymore, it’s right there on all the big social media sites. AO3 didn’t set out to be the main fanfic website, but that’s definitely what it’s become. It’s easy for people to find us--and that includes people who don’t care about the community, and just want “content.”

Transformative fandom doesn’t like it when people see our fanworks as “content”. “Content” is a pretty broad term, but when fandom uses it we’re usually referring to creative works that are churned out by content creators to be consumed by an audience as quickly as possible as often as possible so that the content creator can generate revenue. This not-so-new normal has caused a massive shift in how people who are new to fandom view fanworks--instead of seeing fic or art as something a fellow fan made and shared with you, they see fanworks as products to be consumed.

Transformative fandom has, in general, always been a gift economy. We put time and effort into creating fanworks that we share with our fellow fans for free. We do this so we don’t get sued, but fandom as a whole actually gets a lot out of the gift economy. Offer your community a story, and in return you can get comments, build friendships, or inspire other people to write things that you might want to read. Readers are given the gift of free stories to read and enjoy, and while lurking is fine, they have the choice to engage with the writer and other readers by leaving comments or making reclists to help build the community.

And look, don’t get me wrong. People have never engaged with fanfic as much as fan writers wish they would. There has always been “no one comments anymore” wank. There have always been people who only comment to say “MORE!” or otherwise demand or guilt trip writers into posting the next chapter. But fandom has always agreed that those commenters are rude and annoying, and as those commenters navigate fandom they have the chance to learn proper community etiquette.

However, now it seems that a lot of the people who are consuming fanworks aren’t actually in the community. 

I won’t say “they aren’t real fans” because that’s silly; there’s lots of ways to be a fan. But there seem to be a lot of fans now who have no interest in fandom as a community, or in adhering to community etiquette, or in respecting the gift economy. They consume our fics, but they don’t appreciate fan labor. They want our “content”, but they don’t respect our control over our creations.

And even worse--they see us as a resource. We share our work for free, as a gift, but all they see is an open-source content farm waiting to be tapped into. We shared it for free, so clearly they can do whatever they want with it. Why should we care if they feed our work into AI training datasets, or copy/paste our unfinished stories into ChatGPT to get an ending, or charge people for an unnecessary third-party AO3 app, or sell fanbindings on etsy for a profit without the author’s permission, or turn our stories into poor imitations of podfics to be posted on other platforms without giving us credit or asking our consent, while also using it to lure in people they can datascrape for their Forbes 30 Under 30 company? 

And sure, people have been doing shady things with other people’s fanworks since forever. Art theft and reposting has always been a big problem. Fanfic is harder to flat-out repost, but I’ve heard of unauthorized fic translations getting posted without crediting the original author. Once in…I think the 2010s? I read a post by a woman who had gone to some sort of local bookselling event, only to find that the man selling “his” novel had actually self-published her fanfic. (Wish I could find that one again, I don’t even remember where I read it.)

But aside from that third example, the thing is…as awful as fanart/writing theft is, back in the day, the main thing a thief would gain from it was clout. Clout that should rightfully go to the creators who gifted their work in the first place, yeah, but still. Just clout. People will do a lot of hurtful things for clout, but fandom clout means nothing outside of fandom. Fandom clout is not enough to incentivize the sort of wide-scale pillaging we’re seeing from community outsiders today.

Money, on the other hand… Well, fandom’s just a giant, untapped content farm, isn’t it? Think of how much revenue all that content could generate.

Lurkers are a normal and even beneficial part of any online community. Maybe one day they’ll de-lurk and easily slide into place beside their fellow fans because they already know the etiquette. Maybe they’re active in another community, and they can spread information from the community they lurk in to the community they’re active in. At the very least, they silently observe, and even if they’re not active community members, they understand the community.

Fans who see fanworks as “content” don’t belong in the same category as lurkers. They’re tourists. 

While reading through the initial Reddit thread on the lore.fm situation, I found this comment:

[ID: Reddit User Cabbitowo says: ... So in anime fandoms we have a word called tourist and essentially it means a fan of a few anime and doesn't care about anime tropes and actively criticizes them. This is kind of how fandoms on tiktok feel. They're touring fanfics and fanart and actively criticizes tropes that have been in the fandom since the 60s. They want to be in a fandom but they don't want to engage in fandom 

OP totallymandy responds: Just entered back into Reddit after a long day to see this most recent reply. And as a fellow anime fan this making me laugh so much since it’s true! But it sorta hurts too when the reality sets in. Modern fandom is so entitled and bratty and you’d think it’s the minors only but that’s not even true, my age-mates and older seem to be like that. They want to eat their cake and complain all whilst bringing nothing to the potluck… :/ END ID]

-

“Tourist” is an apt name for this sort of fan. They don’t want to be part of our community, and they don’t have to be in order to come into our spaces and consume our work. Even if they don’t steal our work themselves, they feel so entitled to it that they’re fine with ignoring our wishes and letting other people take it to make AI “podfics” for them to listen to (there are a lot of comments on lore.fm’s shutdown announcement video from people telling them to just ignore the writers and do it anyway). They’ll use AI to generate an ending to an unfinished fic because they don’t care about seeing “the ending this writer would have given to the story they were telling”, they just want “an ending”. For these tourist fans, the ends justify the means, and their end goal is content for them to consume, with no care for the community that created it for them in the first place.

I don’t think this is confined to a specific age group. This isn’t “13-year-olds on Wattpad” or “Zoomers on TikTok” or whatever pointless generation war we’re in now. This is coming from people who are new to fandom, whose main experience with creative works on the internet is this new content culture and who don’t understand fandom as a community. That description can be true of someone from any age group.

It’s so easy to find fandom these days. It is, in fact, too easy. Newcomers face no hurdles or challenges that would encourage them to lurk and observe a bit before engaging, and it’s easy for people who would otherwise move on and leave us alone to start making trouble. From tourist fans to content entrepreneurs to random people who just want to gawk, it’s so easy for people who don’t care about the fandom community to reap all of its fruits. 

So when I say maybe fandom should start gatekeeping a bit, I’m referring to the fact that we barely even have a gate anymore. Everyone is on the internet now; the entire world can find us, and they don’t need to bother learning community etiquette when they do. Before, we were protected by the fact that fandom was considered weird and most people didn’t look at it twice. Now, fandom is pretty mainstream. People who never would’ve bothered with it before are now comfortable strolling in like they own the place. They have no regard for the fandom community, they don’t understand it, and they don’t want to. They want to treat it just like the rest of the content they consume online.

And then they’re surprised when those of us who understand fandom culture get upset. Fanworks have existed far longer than the algorithmic internet’s content. Fanworks existed long before the internet. We’ve lived like this for ages and we like it.

So if someone can’t be bothered to respect fandom as a community, I don’t see why I should give them easy access to my fics.

Think of it like a garden gate

When I interact with commenters on my fic, I have this sense of hospitality.

The comment section is my front porch. The fic is my garden. I created my garden because I really wanted to, and I’m proud of it, and I’m happy to share it with other people. 

Lots of people enjoy looking at my garden. Many walk through without saying anything. Some stop to leave kudos. Some recommend my garden to their friends. And some people take the time to stop by my front porch and let me know what a beautiful garden it is and how much they’ve enjoyed it. 

Any fic writer can tell you that getting comments is an incredible feeling. I always try to answer all my comments. I don’t always manage it, but my fics’ comment sections are the one place that I manage to consistently socialize in fandom. When I respond to a comment, it feels like I’m pouring out a glass of lemonade to share with this lovely commenter on my front porch, a thank you for their thank you. We take a moment to admire my garden together, and then I see them out. The next time they drop by, I recognize them and am happy to pour another glass of lemonade.

My garden has always been open and easy to access. No fences, no walls. You just have to know where to find it. Fandom in general was once protected by its own obscurity, an out-of-the-way town that showed up on maps but was usually ignored.

But now there’s a highway that makes it easy to get to, and we have all these out-of-towner tourists coming in to gawk and steal our lawn ornaments and wonder if they can use the place to make themselves some money.

I don’t care to have those types trampling over my garden and eating all my vegetables and digging up my flowers to repot and sell, so I’ve put up a wall. It has a gate that visitors can get through if they just take the time to open it.

Admittedly, it’s a small obstacle. But when I share my fics, I share them as a gift with my fellow fans, the ones who understand that fandom is a community, even if they’re lurkers. As for tourist fans and entrepreneurs who see fic as content, who have no qualms ignoring the writer’s wishes, who refuse to respect or understand the fandom community…well, they’re not the people I mean to share my fic with, so I have no issues locking them out. If they want access to my stories, they’ll have to do the bare minimum to become a community member and join the AO3 invite queue.

And y’know, I’ve said a lot about fandom and community here, and I just want to say, I hope it’s not intimidating. When I was younger, talk about The Fandom Community made me feel insecure, and I didn’t think I’d ever manage to be active enough in fandom spaces to be counted as A Member Of The Community. But you don’t have to be a social butterfly to participate in fandom. I’ll always and forever be a chronic lurker, I reblog more than I post, I rarely manage to comment on fic, and I go radio silent for months at a time--but I write and post fanfiction. That’s my contribution.

Do you write, draw, vid, gif, or otherwise create? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you leave comments? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you curate reclists? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you maintain a fandom blog or fuckyeah blog? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you provide a space for other fans to convene in? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you regularly send asks (off anon so people know who you are)? Congrats, you're a community member.

Do you have fandom friends who you interact with? Congrats, you're a community member.

There’s lots of ways to be a fan. Just make sure to respect and appreciate your fellow fans and the work they put in for you to enjoy and the gift economy fandom culture that keeps this community going.

#ao3 #lore.fm #fanfiction #fandom history #gift economy #caelum rambles

[wilcze-kudly]

I do find it annoying how a lot of Zutara fans tweak the character's stories, personalities and even the timelines to suit their own needs.

Once again, there's nothing wrong with fanon and headcanons, however if looking through the lense of canon, you're objectively wrong.

I ended up stumbling on a post from a Zutara shipper. (At this point I'm regretfully considering not following the tags for Zuko or Katara because I get way too much Zutara content lol) I'm not replying directly to her because I don't want this to turn into an argument, and I know she doesn't take criticism very well.

Ok, So let's break this down.

The character who was first out of the group to trust Zuko?

I'm quite sure this is referring to the scene in Ba Sing Se's caves. And yes, that is a very important scene. I think it's a very important scene preceeding Zuko's 'relapse'. It shows how he's matured during his time in Ba Sing Se and therefore it serves to add to our dismay when he joins Azula. I adore the fact that Zuko's journey to redemption is not linear, it certainly adds a lot to the character and shows us how his trauma affected him.

It's also a horrific moment for Katara. To have her worldview on Zuko and firebenders as a whole challenged, and then for it to go blowing up in her face. It rips open old wounds of her childhood. It refreshes her resentment of Zuko and the Fire Nation as a whole. It parallels the death of her mother when Aang dies due to Azula's lighting and she is unable to do anything about it. It places her back in that spot of helplessness. Even though she's grown up, even though she's a master waterbender, she still comes a hair's breadth to losing one of the most important people in her life.

No wonder she hated Zuko so much after this.

It's an important moment for both characters, but I wouldn't say it is that in a romantic sense. It's a sweet, hopeful moment that then turns absolutely horrific and visceral for both parties.

I could argue that there are other characters who could be given the title of 'first to trust Zuko'. Funnily, Appa being one of them lol.

But other characters trusting Zuko dovetails nicely into the next point.

The character who emotionally connects to Zuko?

Well, technically, I'd argue that most members of the Gaang connect emotionally on one level or another with him?

But I'd argue that Aang is the person Zuko connected with the most. Aang is Zuko's parallel. Aang is the first person to reach out to Zuko. Aang is the person who showed mercy to Zuko, multiple times. Aang is the person who valued Zuko's life, the life of someone whose whole life goal is to capture him.

This was also an incredibly important moment to Zuko. This is the thing he brings up when trying to convince the Gaang to let him join.

Zuko: Why aren't you saying anything? You once said you thought we could be friends. You know I have good in me.

The character Zuko feels safest letting his guard down around?

It's Mai. Love her or hate her, her relationship with Zuko is incredibly important to him. Maiko isn't my favourite Zuko ship, in full honesty. But even platonically, Mai and Zuko are one another's reprieve from their respective shitty lives.

People often talk about Katara touching Zuko's scar while discussing healing his scar, however one could argue that she did so as a medical examination. Mai touching Zuko's scar is a casual thing, neither of them really make a big deal of it and that's the beauty of it.

I'm mainly talking out of my own personal experience, as someone with a huge amount of burn scars, but there is a world of difference between someone inspecting my scars like Katara did and simply accepting them as a part of me, like Mai does for Zuko.

With Mai, Zuko isn't the scarred banished prince, Ozai's son or Azula's brother. He's just Zuko. And they speak freely with one another, arguing like real people do. Often, being comfortable having arguments is actually a sign of being comfortable with one another.

The character who helps Zuko heal from his trauma?

Once again, this is a bit of a flawed question. By the end of the show, Zuko isn't even fully healed, in my opinion. He has made leaps and bounds on the road to recovery, but when he will truly heal if ever is yet to be seen.

Zuko's journey to recovery includes plenty of people. This includes Iroh, Aang, Song and Jin. People who show him the error of his coping mechanism. Who challenge his worldview, who coax him out of the his shell of pain and anger.

The character known for showing most compassion to others?

Yes, Katara's compassion is a huge part of her character. Her need to help and protect those who cannot do that for themselves cannot be understated.

But Aang's compassion for others and all beings is just as great, if not greater than Katara's. Compassion and nonviolence are huge parts of his culture and his own philosophy.

Aang: Wait, we can't just leave him here. Sokka: Sure we can. Let's go. Aang :No, if we leave him he'll die. Aang airbends himself off Appa and retrieves Zuko, bringing him to Appa. Sokka: [Sarcastically.] Yeah, this makes a lot of sense. Let's bring the guy who's constantly trying to kill us.

Friendly reminder that Aang could've absolutely wrecked Ozai, but held back because his own moral compass was so powerful. Hell, he was friendly and nice to Azula, the woman who literally killed him.

This is why Aang and Katara work so well together. They're both incredibly compassionate people who will immediately jump in to help others in need. Like they did during the Painted Lady, destroying the factiry together.

The character who primarily bears the burden of having to step up into a parental role?

I think "parental role" is an incredibly vague term. There's a lot of things that go into a "parental role". Katara plays a stereotypically "maternal" role, while someone who plays a "paternal" one would probably be Sokka.

Katara deals with very "homemaking" tasks like sewing and cooking, etc. And Sokka often takes on the role of leader, hunter, gatherer and also protector, despite being a nonbender.

This coincides nicely with their core childhood traumas. The loss of Katara's mother impacted her greatly, leading her to have to step up into a motherly role. While Sokka was clearly heavily traumatised by his father departing and the crushing responsibility of having to care for his entire village.

Sexism also probably played a part in this dichotomy.

The character who represses their emotions to be strong for others?

I'd argue that this could apply to all the members of the Gaang in some capacity.

Aang's pain is something most of us will never experience and cannot hope to understand. The complete horrific destruction of his culture and home followed him through the entire show. He was entitled to his grief and rage, yet he supressed it. We see during Appa's kidnapping, how easy it would be for Aang to rage, to let himself be destructive. And yet, he wakes up every day and chooses to smile and goof off, because his friends need someone to remind them how to be children.

Sokka puts on a very impressive bravado, despite having a lot of insecurities. However, as the oldest member of the Gaang (pre Zuko) he puts on a facade of the confident and unbothered older brother. Even if he's the butt of almost every joke, he still keeps that demeanour up, letting it slip only a few times.

I'd actually argue that Toph is the person whom this label fits best. While we know Toph as witty, callous and strong, we have to remember that she kept up the facade of her parents' good, helpless little blind girl for no reason other than her mother and father's comfort. She actually hides a lot of her hurt, covering it up with a prickly exterior.

I want to do longer think pieces about Toph and Katara so apologies if this isn't complete.

I'm actually baffled by the idea of Katara repressing her emotions. She's actually quite straightforward and open about her feelings. She yells and feels a lot of emotions and lets them be heard. She gets angry and sad. She's actually kinda bitchy sometimes and that's honestly why I love her so much.

The whole inciting incident of the show was her getting so pissed off she somehow pulls a giant iceberg from the bottom of the sea.

She is anything but repressed.

She is angry.

She's angry at the fire nation, at Sokka, at her father, at men, and with good right to be so.

This is what makes her an amazing character and one who broke the mould of a lot of female characters at the time. Her anger and unrestrained emotions rang true with a lot of watchers at the time. I'm not sure why this is being taken away from her rather than celebrated.

I reiterate the point I made at the beginning of this post: there is nothing wrong with headcanons and fanon interpretations for one's enjoyment. I do find it a bit odd when it changes a character too much (because then, why not just create an oc?) but it's all in good fun. However, you shouldn't push that onto other people and how they perceive canon and you certainly shouldn't use it to take away from other characters. It's a very unfair way of entering discourse.

#look Katara is my favourite character. don't fuck her up. please #katara #zuko #aang #toph #toph beifong #sokka #uncle iroh #anti zutara #pro kataang #<ig this wasn't really a proper kaatang post lol #pro katara #katara deserved better #avatar katara #atla #avatar: the last airbender #the last airbender #avatar the last airbender #avatar #mai #pro maiko #maiko #kataang

[vigilskeep]

hi! ive seen you talk about your surana a bunch but i dont know if ive seen her full story. what were some of the pivotal decisions she made? i love hearing you talk about your ocs, theyre always so in depth and thought out!

oh thank you!! :) my surana is my Eldest Daughter from my very first full playthrough of a dragon age game, so i think a lot of people newer to the blog (like... from less than a year and a half ago probably lmao) have less of the context in complete form. so i will attempt to summarise!! it may be... long...

minerva surana is a manipulative, driven elven circle mage, heart-breakingly willing to sacrifice whatever she believes is necessary for her Grand Goals, who is often so busy playing 5d chess she forgets she’s a twenty-one year old with no experience of the world outside the tower

okay it did turn out fucking long the rest is under the cut its like 9 bulky paragraphs enjoy

her family were tevinter liberati, elven slaves who had devoted themselves to buying their way out and very recently succeeded. her parents were desperate to see her and her elder sibling grow up knowing only freedom, and sent their children south with another part of the family while they remained to pay off the last of their debts. the journey was long and difficult, and they had little left when they ended up in the denerim alienage. in a twist of bitter irony, magic that might have made minerva someone of value in the imperium saw her freedom once more revoked in the south. minerva remembers nothing of tevinter, and only a few fragments of what came next: of light through the vhenadahl’s branches glinting on a templar’s blade, of her sibling fighting them and being knocked to the ground, terribly still, with blood in their hair, and of her grandmother saying what she might have said many times on that long journey south: we can survive anything, as long as we never look back. ironically, minerva often took that to heart by denying all memory prior to the circle.

young apprentice minerva was a sullen child, with few friends; karl thekla took an elder brother’s interest, and jowan clung to her talent. she only really flourished when, after her terror of her natural gift for spirit magic saw her self-hatred turn dangerous in her early teens, first enchanter irving took an interest. he was a father figure to her, and he showed her how to channel her power into control, and her distress into ambition. newfound devotion to elemental magic saw her hailed as a prodigy, and surely a future first enchanter with irving’s tutelage. (only irving considered her too headstrong for the role. he never told her, fostering the drive he had cultivated, both fearful for the state she might return to if he didn’t, and curious as to what else she might become.) she grew up arrogant and beautiful and deeply loyal to the circle, learning that it was only the weak and the defiant who would fail to thrive there, and convinced she was neither. many of her peers wanted to be her, and few of them wanted to spend much time in her company. except jowan, still the little brother hiding in her shadow, and halliserre amell, a rebellious rival with a winning smile, who made up for their lack of her discipline and raw power with sheer brilliance, and whose heated arguments eventually developed into... ah, something else heated.

not long before the start of the game, amell told her they were going to accept tranquillity. it didn’t matter how clever they were; with their weak magic, they would die in the harrowing. they’d only been so defiant of the circle before because, having accepted their fate, the risks were nothing to them. furious and unable to admit it was because she was in love, the last thing minerva ever said to them when they were whole was that they were a coward not to try. when jowan told her he feared he too would be made tranquil, minerva was still recovering from the loss, not to mention flushed with even more arrogance than normal from her own successful harrowing. she had been the perfect circle mage all her life, twice as good as everyone else to make up for every rumour about where she was from. surely she had earned one defiance. surely she could save this one thing, her oldest friend. and she is a loyal person, in her way, emotion powering her fierce drive, incapable of abandoning what she has set her heart on. irving, from whom she had learned everything, was ahead of her every step of the way. he arranged for her to be taken in by the grey wardens. she had proved herself as headstrong and unsuitable as he had feared—and she was shocked and bitterly betrayed to finally see that—but he also believed this might bring her to where she would truly belong.

as a grey warden, minerva’s highest concern is perception. when the stakes of the game are revealed, she has enough hubris to see it as a chance to not just save but change the world. defeating the archdemon isn’t enough. she needs to be seen defeating the archdemon, at the forefront, as an elven mage; she has enough idealism to believe it will really matter for her and people like her, and enough shrewd cynicism to consider what she may have to sacrifice to achieve it. mostly she approaches problems with the skill for diplomacy and management that irving taught her, with that good good Master Coercion skill. she gets many of the “better” and certainly more peaceful quest outcomes, not always motivated by altruism, but determined to be remembered well when she leaves each faction behind. her one great sacrifice of this goal to be seen as the perfect mage is when she takes up blood magic, determined after she sees its power that she alone can handle it, to get the job done and keep what’s hers alive fight after fight. but that only makes her more dedicated to her actions elsewhere

the real test and most pivotal moment of her arc is at the landsmeet. she has arranged anora’s marriage to an alistair hardened for the role (once more following irving’s example, learning to teach ambition as he had taught hers. is there love in that, or just selfishness? she doesn’t know). all that matters is that the joint rule neatly fulfils her desire for compromise to please all parties. but then she struggles between two aspects of her goal: she wants to be seen, personally, as the victor; she does not want every noble in ferelden to see her kill the hero of river dane with magic. she knows how that scene will be remembered, in the end. when riordan suggests recruiting him instead, it seems the perfect solution to everything, the salvation of the day. and then she realises she’s broken alistair’s heart, just when he’s breaking hers. she is incapable of backing down in front of them all (it’s only to alistair, her alistair, but she can’t do it—not to a human, and not to someone part of her will always see as a templar—not when everything she wants was so close.) he abandons her for the throne she taught him to want. she goes on with loghain in the party, and eventually—unable to let loghain snatch the final sacrifice from her grasp, and realising she does want to win and live, after it all—convinces him to do the dark ritual.

in terms of her most important relationships with companions: minerva traditionally romances zevran, who is in many ways uniquely her match having learned the same bitter lessons with the crows that she learned from the circle, and who is so dear to her and capable of lightening her heart when no-one else can. i’ve also experimented with the idea of her romancing alistair, to really dramatise the Landsmeet Divorce and capitalise on future political shenanigans where she could one day be his mistress, but more traditionally they are simply an extremely closely trauma-bonded pair of people who are incapable, at least that year, of really understanding each other deep down. it falls into a pattern where she loves someone with all that fierce drive, enough to die for them, but she will always prioritise what she thinks they need over what they are saying and what they want, often with misjudgements and terrible consequences for them both. it was true with amell, it’s true for many others

she has something very intense and homoerotic going on with morrigan, she has a strained relationship with leliana and wynne, and she has respect and comradeship and a fair bit of fundamental disagreement with sten and loghain. the awakening squad are the people she will consider family for life, most notably nathaniel who she started out not liking at all and is now her work wife, her right hand, can finish her sentences, etc.; anders, who remembers her as karl’s annoying teacher’s pet telltale little sister and is still sometimes baffled by who she’s become; velanna, who makes minerva her most genuine self by having regular screaming matches with her as a sign of affection; and oghren who tried to quit drinking at the same time she tried to quit blood magic, leading to many conversations that deeply baffled everyone around them.

the “current” minerva surana is a sharp-tongued leader who was born for the role of warden-commander, who loves her work and that it matters, who has a truer confidence that is less blindly arrogant and more willing to admit to mistakes, who has worked her breathless way up to h*lding h*ands in public with someone she loves, who has finally learned the hard lesson that the world needs more than an heroic example who followed all the rules to truly be bettered... and who, as rebellion brews, has never been one to sit back and watch while others changed the world

#minerva surana #i THINK thats everything major... it must be #minerva enjoyers who im sure remember more of my posts than me tell me if i missed anything crucial writing this in one sitting #shes my babygirl. thats crucial. #i didnt cover the exact details of her quest decisions bc i think abt changing them a lot #def bringing the sides together in nature of the beast. bhelen supporter and she rlly cultivates that alliance she loves orzammar #ive never played it but in retrospect i believe she wouldve killed connor #and. saved the circle. given that the other option is [checks notes] murdering her dad for the crime of [checks notes again] being tortured

[olderthannetfic]

https://www.tumblr.com/olderthannetfic/750548921882918912/i-know-this-is-insanely-politically-incorrect-of?source=share

From what I've seen, the cis queer boys who pull the "ewwww, fujos" thing tend to be ace/aro, not gay.

Ace boys* have a lot in common with trans boys. They are both only nominally welcome in any queer space that isn't expressly made for them and them only, and they are both told that their identity isn't real, isn't acutally queer, and just generally isn't valid. They both often end up in places (like Tumblr) where being a boy or man of any kind is considered immoral and dangerous to women and "real" queers. And they are both told that being the kind of boy they are is antithetical to masculinity, and that this is a good thing.

Asexuality is considered inherently soft and weak and feminine, and ace boys are told that this makes them Better and Purer than "real" men, in much the same way trans boys are told that their bodies make them both not actually male and morally superior to cis boys and men (and whatever other identities are getting lumped in with cis men this week, usually trans men who pass too well or trans women who wear cargo shorts, but that's another rant).

It's not surprising that someone who is marginalised and invalidated within their own communities, at an age and life stage where they're only just figuring themselves out, would be the sort who would fall for this stuff.

***

So how it's shaped is there's a group (Tumblr queers) you want to earn recognition and acceptance from, but they don't like you and tell you you're not good enough for them. The group claims that XYZ random thing (yaoi) is inherently harmful to a third party (gay men), and that thing is kinda squicky to you.

And you see a path to acceptence and group membership shining clearly. Reject the yaoi! Make a huge scene about how it makes you (a more socially acceptable and morally pure version of "queer man") feel weird when you think about the dirty terrible other people who enjoy yaoi! They'll see that you aren't a filthy fujo with a woman's sexuality OR a gross and ugly queer man, you're a pure and wholesome and soft and nonthreatening boy. They HAVE to accept you now!

***

Which is all a very long way of saying that marginalized and ostracized boys tend to fall for purity police traps because they don't have the experience and context to know any better and because they're desperate for validation and community.

*I'm saying "boys" because I'm specifically talking about young people here and not talking about adult trans and ace men.

--

[mari-lair]

Hello and good day! I'm sorry if this has already been asked before and you can totally just ignore this if you want, but I'm curious: can you imagine a world where somehow, Aoi likes someone else and not Akane? Cause I think that while the canon version of her is cute, I have recently read a what-if fanfic in her pov where she absolutely hates Akane the same way she does her other admirers and now I am hyperfixating on that. What habits would have been different compared to canon Aoi? Would Akane have grown more deperate since he (presumably) would know that Aoi genuinely does not like him in this scenario? What if he began noticing Aoi starting to like her dream boy in class? The possibilities are killing meeeeee!

Oh man, I'm the wrong person to ask this cause I genuinely can't imagine this scenario being possible without obliterating Akane's characterization.

Do you remember why Akane fell in love with Aoi? Because Aoi loved him so much that she broke her "cold and indifferent, hate dealing with people" mask for him. She TRIED so hard to hate him but still ended up crying cause she cared so much.

If the mask was real and she truly didn't care about him, I don't think Akane would fall for her.

If he did fall for her later on anyways, I can't see him trying to pursue her after being rejected/met with her discomfort/annoyance. Even in the timeline where she does like him and comes up with the silliest of excuses to keep him around without straight up accepting his confessions, he had admitted that he would keep keeping her safe while keeping a distance in case she doesn't want him.

He only pursues her so much cause she actively flirts and encourages him to.

The idea Aoi would encourage him if she didn't like him does make Akane pestering her believable but at the cost of Aoi's own character being obliterated. I don't think I'm being harsh when I say Aoi would be a bitch if she went "hehe try harder <3 Impress me Akane-kun!" consistently enough for him to buy it that she could date him while thinking "Tch, hate this guy, he keeps harassing me".

That would means she doesn't even consider him a friend, she doesn't care AT ALL about his feelings, which is nothing like the Aoi who tries to pretend the people she dislikes don't bother her/don't exist and loves her friends dearly, putting them above her.

The most I can picture is Aoi falling for someone else and Akane either not getting a crush on her and supporting her fully, or slowly putting some barrier between them cause he can see Aoi doesn't like him and being in pain, the classic 'i want her to be happy' and 'she won't be with me' conflict where he has a crisis but eventually learn to let her go, reach the point he can be comfortable by her side even when she is with someone else.

Or Aoi realizing Akane likes her romantically and being anxious that she has to reject a friend, whom she deeply values, but her growing unease and lack of encouragement wouldn't be able to fool Akane for long. Their whole thing is that they know each other well after all and Akane consistently asks 'are you okay?' when he senses anything may be wrong with Aoi.

Maybe it would take some months for Akane to understand without Aoi giving him a straight-up rejection, especially if they are small when he gets the crush, but Akane pays so much attention to her, he would pick up the signs she is uncomfortable, especially if it reaches a point of Aoi staring to resent him for it more than being scared of losing him. He either drop it silently or straight up confront her about it, probably.

#full disclosure i hate 'what ifs' that turn kind characters into very non complex mean people #so again. I am not the best person to ask this. I have negative bias T-T #but the base premise of 'aoi liking someone else' can be interesting #i just never saw it done without either aoi or akane becoming caricature of themselves #tbhk #toilet bound hanako kun #aoi akane #akane aoi #jshk

[suplicyy]

hi!! can you write headcanons on oikawa? :)

Reader x Oikawa Tooru headcanons

Summary — Headcannons of what it would be like if you were in a relationship with him!

— Fluff

— Gn! Reader

This boy LOVES pda.

Anywhere at any time he will be showing physical affection towards you, be it hugs, putting his head on your shoulders, kisses... the list of what this man can do is looong.

And if you're not a big fan of showing affection in public, he'll respect that, and choose to hold your hands in his.

And when you're alone, that's when he won't let go of you.

Many people who are not in his daily life may not realize this, but his routine is not that healthy. He will often train exceeding his limits, and sometimes he will only stop if someone stops him.

So you would need to be there to support and guide him so he doesn't overstep his own limits.

Call him to your house, or go to his house; Cozy up on the living room couch while watching a random movie, but that alone will be enough to make the guy feel good again.

Just being by your side, even if it's brief moments, completely invigorates him. It's almost as if you were his battery, a simple hug and he would be charged again.

And don't worry about his fans, if that's what you're thinking!

Of course, he will continue to sign autographs and accept gifts – so as not to seem rude – but he will always make it clear to everyone that there is only room for two things in his heart: volleyball and you.

And it would also be very difficult for someone not to know that you two are in a relationship, since he makes a point of letting everyone know.

His Instagram can be considered yours too, since most of the posts and stories he posts are about you and the dates he takes you on. In addition to him always following you anywhere as if he were your shadow.

And please go to his games! One of the things he loves most in this world is when his eyes find you in the stands cheering for him. This definitely increases his performance on the court.

He would definitely dedicate one of his arm-ripping serves to you.

And at the end of the game, he would run up to you to hug you – even though he was all sweaty – and if you pushed him away, he would pretend to be offended and make a drama in front of you, saying that you don't love him anymore.

Give him a kiss and his tearful theater changes instantly.

He would always make sure you knew how much he loved you, and it wouldn't just be with physical affection!

Whether it's saying sweet things in your ear, or giving you that necklace you were flirting with in a store window, or just giving you your favorite food when you're feeling down.

From the smallest gestures to the biggest, he does it with all the love in his heart.

A/N — Second request I received yay!!! I'm having a lot of fun writing these, so it's quite possible that this week I'll continue to be active here, then I hope you liked it!! ^_^💕

#haikyuu x reader #haikyuu headcanons #haikyuu #oikawa tooru #oikawa tooru x reader #oikawa #oikawa fluff #fluff #reader x character #aoba johsai #aoba josai x reader

[frownyalfred]

Interesting thing about the bastard Damian idea, is that Damian would probably not consider himself illegitimate, but the Wayne's might. In the original comic that was retconned as Damain's backstory, Talia and Bruce were married... Technically. There wasn't a ceremony, but Ra's announces they are married, and Bruce agrees and brings Talia back to the States as his wife. For a lot of cultures that's enough for a marriage (public acknowledgment and moving in together) but high class Americans definitely aren't going to consider that legitimate.

So Damian was probably raised with the knowledge that his parents are/were married at the time of his birth, and now some people he doesn't know are trying to say that he isn't the legitimate heir.

This is definitely going to end in swords and tears.

Lots of tears, yes. Because everyone except the old guard can see why making up rules about who’s legitimate and not is so stupid and pointless. Has Bruce claimed them as his own? Good, they’re his.

Not another plug for Mando adoptions but I feel like Bruce really fits them — the only thing you have to do to create a legal parental bond with someone is to say the adoption vow (I know your name as my child) and for the kid to accept in front of a witness. That’s it, boom.

#asks #anon #bruce wayne #batman #dc #batfamily

[euniexenoblade]

I ve seen a few things being said that i think just isnt the case always.

1. That making an egg joke is about actually thinking someone's trans

Which doesnt at all have to be the case, if youre in any group of people with a lot of trans people a 'well thats not necessarily a permanent condition' might slip out just because its funny in context.

2. That the people being made uncomfortable by them are not the ones being called eggs.

Ive personally seen it happen, and a lot of people have posted about it too

And 3. That being uncomfortable about this has to be about transmisogyny

Just like making statements saying you know things about someone that they dont can also just feel invasive on its face youknow? Sidenote i think this can be especially true if they actually might be trans

Ive just been bothered by people pretending that these things cant be true sometimes id love to hear your thoughts

I already said that. Infact it's literally in the thing you screencapped. Egg jokes are comedic comparisons to trans people, not a declaration that someone is for a fact trans.

I never said people can't be uncomfortable with egg jokes. What I said later in the post is people are using their personal experiences to dictate how other people are allowed to act with their friends and use their personal experiences to attack other people irrelevant to their experience. I have at multiple points said if someone is uncomfortable with egg jokes, don't make them about that person. But, i DO think a lot of issue with egg jokes is internalized transphobia.

It is transmisogyny. Specifically the issue on this site with egg jokes is inherently tied to transmisogyny. Removing this claim out of it's context makes it seem crazy, but it is. We have had an ongoing issue with egg jokes/trans women telling cis men they're trans since December and it's literally spurred up and made worse by terfs and the 'pedojackets trans women' club. Also, considering egg jokes originate from transfem communities "the chick hatching from an egg' and largely is used and done by transfems, and transfems have been harassed and ran off the site for egg jokes, yes this is a transmisogyny issue. I will not fold on this. Denial of this point is just acceptance of transmisogyny.

#disk horse

[girls-and-honey]

.

#okay so random tag post even though it's been ages #me thinks the current place i work is actually decent a la accepting-queer-ppl so?? miiiiight. consider actually putting my #pronouns in my email signature (which hardly gets used but shh) but like. the actual ones not the society/people assume anyway ones #idk i attended a virtual tech focused event for trans dov (yes early but they didn't want to put the event on sun) and you know when #everyone is just sharing their stories and experiences and it's just like... an overwhelming sense of community? anyway that #and since it was hosted by a professional org the topics were all workplace focused and mayhaps that's something i'm thinking abt for #this year. at least within our pride group I might be ready? wild bc for a long time tumblr has been the only place I feel comfy being 100% #myself. but hearing real people's stories makes me feel like that kind of community would be nice to have elsewhere too #and the whole looking to others also turns around into the leading by example thing bc then we had some breakout groups at the end for #networking which is not my favorite but! i did my intro and said I use she/her for work but will use she/they for this group and #then the next person said he/him at work but for this group he/they so that made me wonder if it was bc of me saying so first? #which if it was is kind of like oh. the way I'm looking for those people for me.. I can also be that for someone else #anyway this sounds dumb typed out but irl/professional me has always separated out queer identity so it's new to me #i'm allowed to be giddy okay. just a little. as a treat (is tumblr still using 'as a treat' i really hope so) #oh shit is this what gender euphoria feels like #alright that's it for now i think #gah emotions and whatnot #missed you all btw i'll start actually being online again soon #personal

[autisticlee]

that feeling when you get advice from someone who you know is well-meaning and has good intentions....but it's just the most allistic, neurotypical, and/or abled advice you have ever heard and completely invalidates the point you're trying to make about why you struggle to do the thing in the first place.

they're telling you to "do it in this specific way that is completely opposite of how you physically/mentally work" for example, make eye contact/read people's facial expressions and intentions! but you're autistic. initiate verbal conversation and don't be shy! but you're nonverbal or semispeaking. get out of the house more and participate in these physical activities! but you're physically disabled. Just Be Yourself! but you have DID/OSDD/other personality disorder. etc.

i'm sorry. I know you're just trying to help. I appreciate it, really. but it's all things i've heard before and none of it helps me specifically. I have tried (maybe even still try out of habit) and learned I can't just do those things. they don't work for me or cause more issues. practice isn't the issue. not everyone can simply willpower through everything. but thanks for trying 😔✊️

#autistic #autism things #autism #actually autistic #adhd #audhd #neurodivergent #disablity #disabled #too tired to tag other thinhs sorry thats all you get #lee rambles #that feeling when you also just have to pretend to accept their advice and move on because people get so upset when you dont take it #i lesrned if i tell people their advice doesnt suit me and my unique circumstances then they feel bad that they didnt help #they want you to do it anyway. even if you cant. pretend you do or say thanks and move on. but it gets annoying hearinf the same stuff #over and over. more expectations on you. more pressure to do things in ways everyone else can but you cannot... #when will the advice be lee shaped? when will it be just for lee and consider all my circumstances? #why is telling the person giving advice their advice wont work fkr me bad? why cant they change their advice to fit the issues i face? #when im asked for advice and someone hits a deadend while working it out i try to help solve that so they can find a way around #but everyone else expects me to grow a bulldozer out of my head and ram the wall down instead of helping me work around it #i crush their fragile ego by saying their advice doesnt work and they get upset instead of adjusting it to help solve the specific problem #its exhausting because they become one of the many problems i have to deal with then 😒 #no im not “making excuses/dismissing you/not trying” im trying. your advice sucks try again. and my problems are valid!!!!!! accept it!!!! #anyway. genuinely appreciate people wanting/trying to help but sometimes its such inappropriate advice i dont know how to respond

[bayofalgecirascranes]

The Muse has barreled back into my head with a scene from an AU where Kuzon of Shijuichi ends up with Zuko on the Wanyi and during the scene where Zhao is like "I'm placing your troops under my command" Kuzon is like "I'm afraid that won't be possible, Admiral." And Zhao does his patented Leer and says "And what could you possibly mean by that?" and Kuzon does his patented Rock Spike Through The Throat and says "I imagine you'll find it quite difficult to take command of his Highness' crew once there's no longer a 'you' who can take command".

#atla #atla oc #atla au #that would be a fascinating au where Zhao gets killed by a member of Zuko's/his own crew before the siege of the North could happen #In his free time on the ship he'd make little stone figurines to send to his family #Nobody knows how he makes them but seems like a harmless passtime all things considered #(It was not in fact harmless) #Also during the storm he'd get into a minor argument with Iroh #And refuse to accept Iroh's apology unless it was also paired with an explanation or at least an excuse #He also seems to Know Someone at literally every port they stop at #'Oh he was one of my father's old students' #'We're technically in the EARTH KINGDOM' #'I did say he teaches people from all walks of life' #'What did you say he teaches again?' #'Oh just one of the local martial arts nothing so flashy as your firebending' #Anyway BRB gotta beat The Muse back with a stick

[depresseddepot]

the way i try so SO hard to gain even a crumb of body neutrality only to then see some shit on twitter that remind me that oh yeah. a distinct portion of the population genuinely believes they are being discriminated against when they have to look at or be within 50 feet of a fat person

#the amount of times ive heard my skinny friends call themselves fat and disgusting to my face without considering the implications #i saw some tweet that just like. had a fat person in the video and ALL of the responses were men making fun of her #like. yes i realize my life would be so much better if i was born with a faster metabolism. thank you for reminding me #yes i realize i am not treated seriously because i am fat #that sort of incredulous look skinny people give you when you have the audacity to sit near them on the bus or ask for directions #like they're shocked you weren't some round thing that was in their sights for 2 seconds to make fun but disappeared #i am trying very hard not to let it get to me but when so many people seem to think the same thing it feels stupid #likei know i dont see people the way allosexuals do but are fat people really so disgusting that they feel like they can say shit like that #its so so frustrating #if i am going to die alone because of my own failings i can learn to accept that #but if i die alone because i can't find anybody that doesn't think fat people are worthless then what is the fucking point lmao #''people irl dont actually think that'' i cant count on 1 hand the amount of skinny people who have lamented about their weight to my face #someone brings in cookies to work and as im eating one someone skinny says ''well. i really don't need the extra calories so ill pass'' #someone skinny checking out diet/exercise books because they ''REALLY have to lose some weight'' #no they aren't talking about me/to me but how detached from your surroundings do you have to be to shit on yourself for your weight #like. even if i was skinny they're still talking about how gross and ugly they are around kids #''love your body and your self!!!1!!1'' okay then stop calling yourself disgusting regardless of how much you weigh. #you can think if if you want but god that 12 year old girl in line behind you is going to remember that forever #she is going to internalize ''oh okay. thats what a disgusting body looks like'' #andthen she'll grow up and hate herself and continue the fucking cycle #just stop. stop talking about your weight around kids. i dont need 60 yo women telling me they're gross when they weigh maybe 150 lbs #i know this is super unhealthy but i literally cannot wait until i can move out and isolate myself from society #because every second i try to engage with it is literal torture #yall are so mean for no reason #i dont really have much to live for #but it would be helpful if skinny people didn't constantly reiterate that there's no point to living if you aren't skinny #im so tired #vent

[pepprs]

not to be a pain-crazed wild animal. i KNOW i do this every time. but p*riods are so fucking crazy. like my cr*mps are so bad my body is trying to strangle itself but im awake and i need to be at work in 2 hrs and get thru an entire 9 hr workday as if im not in excruciating pain and im gonna bring my heating pad and my p*in r*lief cr*am if you catch my drift (💀) and i’ll need to use them DURING a busy day in which i will not see any other ppl who get periods in person and using them is gonna be a whole awkward thing. like omg. this is not fucking normal lol

#purrs #it is normal obviously. but it’s SO fucking frustrating like omfg the amount of time i lose every single month to being in pain like this #FOR NO REASON and like half the global population has to deal w that and it’s like it’s nothing. idk. despair and suffering and misery #delete later #menstruation tw #the thing that really gets me abt it is how my mom (ik i said i would stop complaining abt her on here but we have been fighting all month #LOL so im giving myself permission) gets so fucking pissed at me and my sister when we’re in too much pain to do chores bc she thinks we’re #being lazy / making excuses and then she compares us to o it brother like.. omg um YOU should know how painful this can be first of all and #second of all why would you even make that comparison when he doesn’t lose a third of his life to his body trying to tear itself apart! lol! #and yes i could work from home or calll out sick but consider: i am mentally illabout not being at work. which * is gonna be on my ass abt w #when they hear me say that bc i know im gonna make a whole awkward big deal abt my heating pad. UGHHHHH embarrassing lmaooooo #like why do people have REGULAR B*DILY F*NCTIONS!!!!! REGULAR!!!!!!! that REGULARLY put them in this amount of pain and we have to just deal #with that like it’s nothing and be discreet about and whatever. ew i sound like um… someone who cares too much abt stuff like this lol but I #im so mad abt it rn like oh my GOD can the pain just not be part of it can we just evolve to get rid of that or put structures in place in a #society for ppl to be more accepting / supporting / whatever of it. please please please please please #(also goes for more than just p*riods btw. like imagine if as a society we had things in place for ppl who are regularly in #chronic ​pain of any kind 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍 what a world that would be 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍 wow i sure hope it happens in my lifetime 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍)

[trans-leek-cookie]

someone talking about the ways media and common tropes/depictions of things that are either explicitly or implicitly linked to marginalized people are demonized and presented badly is not a fucking opportunity for you to flex how you're doing it Differently And Better

#I'll rb the post but I domt want to add it on cause it feels. Not my place maybe #Anyway fun fact! You can think that all you fucking want! Close your God damn mouth about it and figure out if it actually adds to the #Conversation! Marginalized ppl don't have to hear about how you're hashtag Not Like The Others!!! TAKE IN THE INFORMATION AND CONSIDER IF #THE THINGS YOU DO TRULY DEFY STEREOTYPES OR ARE STILL IMPLICITLY INSPIRED BY THESE BIASES!!! AND DO IT QUIETLY OR WITH SOMEONE WHOS WILLING #TO LISTEN! NOT ON THE POST INFORMING YOU OF THE PROBLEMS EXISTENCE #Also I'd move this tag up but genuinely idk if I can do that atm. But I'm LITERALLY guilty of the same shit. I immediately jump to no true #Scotsman the subject because I want to defend it!!! Yes I recognize the pattern is wrong and yes I genuinely believe it isn't necessarily #Inherent! But I still have to confront the fact that it's so prominent and to many people inseparable from the subject #(That being disability and body horror). I will say: my immediate instinct was to disregard any body horror that is just like Real Shit Tha #Happens To People as body horror but that's not helpful! I can't just say well it's not body horror BECAUSE PEOPLE STILL CALL AND SEE IT AS #BODY HORROR!!! I HAVE TO STOP AND CONSIDER THE LARGER IMPLICATIONS. My PERSONAL OPINIONS do not matter and the pedantic discussion is #Something to be had with friends or used as it's own criticism of the genre not ON THE POST CALLING OUT A REAL ISSUE! Anyway just. #Both artists and consumers have to be critical of What we see as body horror/what others tell us is body horror/what we accept as body #Horror bc/what we create as body horror etc. We NEED to confront that and we can't just say I Wouldn't Do That! We need to understand that #It goes deeper than that!!! Also YOU DONT INHERENTLY KNOW WHATS POSSIBLE FOR A HUMAN TO EXPERIENCE #There's so many things that ppl can experience and Live With! There are obviously things that are fatal so u rarely hear abt them but human #Beings can survive a lot of things!!! And here's the thing: the rarer something is the shittier it feels to have it misrepresented!!! #At the very basic level: CHECK IF THE THING YOU WANT TO USE AS BODY HORROR IS A RECORDED PHENOMENON AT LEAST!!! FOR THE LOVE OF FUCK #DO THE BARE MINIMUM

[vampiratecaptain]

replaying da2 and brought aveline to night terrors for the first time and. WHAT was that reaction.

told my mage hawke to her face (on a friendship path. after she wasn’t even mad about the whole betrayal thing bc she’s still in her people-pleaser attitude at this point) that she was less opposed to the gallows bc she, personally, could not resist a demon and implied she didn’t think of mages as people?

and then when hawke asked if she should be locked up the answer was ‘i don’t know’? i can only imagine after hearing that she went and collected anders & merrill to go on some super important business that she desperately needed their help with a good ways outside of kirkwall and fell off the map for a few days at least because she’s an apostate from a family of apostates and that sort of sentence set off every ‘pack up and run‘ instinct she had.

#aspen plays da #da2 #aveline critical #i guess? mostly just cannot keep this thought to myself because WHAT #aveline. you're talking to your mage friend. who you SAW turn down a demon's deal. this sounds a bit like it could be a personal issue. #anyway reevaluating things and alana and aveline's relationship is taking a SHARP nosedive sooner than i thought. #at first it was going to be after she became champion and didn't have to hide her magic anymore. so she had more freedom to not desperately #try and stay in people's good graces. but now. well. #also i did the long road right before this. the tune changed from 'i'll always be there for you hawke' to 'i'm not going to deny i think you #should be locked in the worst circle in thedas which i know is your worst fear btw and also i'll say to your face that i think mages might #not be people. this is an acceptable thing to say to someone i consider a friend'. #WHAT.

[armandjolras]

.

#why is it suddenly considered acceptable to tell people to kill themselves over a difference of opinion? #this didn’t happen to me I just see it so often #and just saw a post where ppl are making fun of others being uncomfortable with suicide baiting #telling someone to kill themselves doesn’t make your argument stronger doesn’t help anything and even if they are being annoying there are #a hundred different things you could say #i don’t understand how someone can tell a person to kill themselves and not feel bad about saying that #idk maybe I’m overreacting #suicide mention tw